A wise saying goes like this: ‘Scald not your lips in another man’s porridge’. Poghos Ter-Nersesian and his compatriots from Syria were seduced by the rosy promises of the Armenian authorities and agreed to resettle in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan several years ago. I am more than sure that they are now convinced of the genius of the wise proverb through their own bitter experience. It is not even the last drop of the bitter cup the Armenians authorities forced the deceived arrivals to drink. The day is not far away when Poghos Ter-Nersesian and others like him will be forced to immediately leave the ancestral Azerbaijani lands, where the true owners did not invite them.

They should take their claims for their unenviable fate to the Armenian authorities and the organizations, who zealously tried to settle Armenians from various countries illegally in the Azerbaijani lands under the Armenian occupation. These recruiters saw the bloody events in the Middle East, particularly in Syria, as a wonderful opportunity to carry out their criminal designs, turning these unfortunate people, who were fleeing the horrors of civil war in their own countries, into hostages of Yerevan’s assessor policy.

In September 2013, the ‘Deputy Prime Minister’ of the separatist regime in Nagorno-Karabakh Artur Aghabekyan stated in an interview to Radio Liberty that his ‘government’ was ready to accept Syrian Armenians, refugees due to ongoing hostilities in Syria. While summoning the Syrian Armenians to move to the NK and become a full-fledged member of the society, he promised each migrant individual support on behalf of his ‘government’.

The explanation behind such enthusiastic behaviour on Aghabekyan’s part hides behind the official policy pursued by Yerevan, who inspired the settlement of immigrants from foreign Armenian communities into the occupied Azerbaijani territories. Government structures, particularly the Armenian Ministry of Diaspora, actively promoted and encouraged the policy. Yerevan-based Armenian Revolutionary Federation acted especially zealously and developed a special program called Help Your Brother.

Even before Aghabekyan made his ‘historic’ statement, one of the ‘spiritual’ mentors of the Karabakh separatists, Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan, had stated during his visit to NK that Khankendi and Yerevan should be ready to accept refugees from Syria. At the same time, the information they had published reported that 34 Armenian families from Syria, mostly engaged in agriculture, had already been settled in the occupied territories, mostly in Lachin Region. At beck and call, Aghabekyan was quick to report that Karabakh was ready to accept the migrants and they had already commissioned to study all local communities to find out how many empty houses there were to welcome the refugees.

Back in January-February 2005, a special OSCE mission visited the occupied territories of Azerbaijan adjacent to Nagorno-Karabkh to investigate such facts. They confirmed Armenia’s policy of illegal population of these lands in their report. Another similar OSCE mission was sent to the seven occupied regions adjacent to NK in October 2010.

In 2005, the OSCE Minsk Group co-chairs travelled to these territories on an assessment mission and confirmed that 14,000 people lived in the occupied Azerbaijani lands. They highlighted infrastructural changes and economic activities. They also noted that the administrative borders of the occupied territories were shifting. They included all these facts in their mission report.

Despite all the facts included in these reports and point-blank objections by the official Baku against the criminal resettlement policy pursued by Armenia, the Armenian authorities and the leaders of the separatist regime in NK proceeded to shill Armenians from Syria and Lebanon into the occupied Azerbaijani lands. Azerbaijan turned to the UN in August 2013 to report Armenia’s blatant policy. Even after doing so, the aforementioned Aghabekyan still stated in his interview that the separatist regime would continue their support for the refugees. ‘Supporting refugees is a worthy cause and the international community has always given an adequate reaction to it. If Azerbaijan wishes to oppose this initiative, the UN should be first to draw conclusions. And we do not even care about their position in general,’ he snapped sharply, urging Baku to withhold from offering an opinion on the decisions made by the NK ‘leadership’.

It is, therefore, not surprising at all that the Azerbaijani Ministry of Defence reported that the population in the occupied territories increased by 23 thousand people in 2015 due to illegally resettled residents.

Azerbaijan has repeatedly sent detailed reports based on irrefutable evidence to various regional and international organizations, demanding Armenia to stop their egregious policy. Particularly, ‘Illegal economic and other activities in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan’, a report by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Azerbaijan for 2016, reads that even the Armenian statistics shows the increasing population of settlers in the occupied territories of Azerbaijan.

‘Occupied regions of Kalbajar, Lachin, Gubadli and Zangilan are attractive as territories with economic potential. They are of particular importance in terms of water, mineral, energy and agricultural resources. Their goal is to increase the population. Armenia is trying to ride the wave of new settlement, thus encouraging the resettlement of Syrian Armenians in the occupied territories, which simplifies this process’, the report reads.

The document also stresses that the Syrian Armenians settled in these territories are summoned for military service and serve as a part of the Armenian armed forces stationed there. Moreover, Yerevan assigns new and existing settlements geographical names of historical content, such as ‘New Cilicia’, ‘Van’ and many others. They, thus, resort to tricks, draw historical parallels and try to support the resettlement of even more Armenians. These undeniable facts refute Yerevan’s claims about Armenia not being directly involved in the settlement.

Even the 2019 report by Azercosmos confirmed objectiveness of Baku’s position and deceit in Yerevan’s statements. The report indicated that the scale of construction and repair works of residential buildings, houses and other social infrastructure facilities had grown in Karabakh, specifically in Lachin. Developing social infrastructure is directly related to the encouragement of settling in these territories. Still further, the Armenian government gave apartments to the Syrian Armenians free of charge, with the ‘ownership right’ at that.

Syrians for Truth and Justice , a Syrian human rights organization, noted in information they circulated that Armenia summoned hundreds of militants and Syrian Armenians from Syria, as well as Syrian Armenians from Karabakh, to combat against Azerbaijan during the 44-day Patriotic War in 2020.

Therefore, Armenia employed the policy of resettling ethnic Armenians from the Middle East, particularly from Syria, with several goals in mind.

First thing first. Despite the notorious ‘victory’ in the first Karabakh War, the socio-economic situation in Armenia and NK was left in a deplorable state. This inspired massive out migration from both Armenia and NK.

Secondly, people were not particularly eager to move from Armenia into the occupied Azerbaijani lands. The ones that did were probably the most desperate. The psychological state of the Armenians also played a part. They were perfectly aware that they would have to get of the occupied lands sooner or later, as Azerbaijan would never agree with the established status quo. Incidentally, they initially tempted the Syrian Armenians with moving to Armenia, not the occupied territories. Most of them had to face the criminality of the fait accompli after they arrived in Armenia.

Thirdly, Yerevan tried to change the demographic situation in its favour through resettling a certain number of Syrian Armenians. They were counting on the outcome of the peaceful settlement. If the sides reached an agreement on holding a referendum to determine the final status of NK, they could count on a ‘victory’ by fraudulently achieving superiority in numbers at the expense of the Syrian migrants. However, as Azerbaijan achieved a brilliant victory in the Second Karabakh War, Armenia had to bid their delusive hopes for a plebiscite goodbye.

Fourthly, the resettlement policy served Armenia’s even more sophisticated criminal goal. Yerevan understood perfectly that Azerbaijan would eventually begin to liberate its territories under military duress, which could lead to casualties among Armenians fleeing the civil war in Syria as well. This provided the Armenians with a perfect excuse to accuse the ‘barbarian Azerbaijanis’ of not sparing the unfortunate Syrian refugees.

Azerbaijan’s military-political and diplomatic might smashed all these cunning Armenian plans to smithereens at the core. Aghabekyan, who was so arrogant in his expressions about Azerbaijan’s policy, had to eat his own words. Thus, the policy of resettling Syrian Armenians in the native Azerbaijani lands failed miserably. Most of these people became hostages to Armenia’s nefarious plans, who simple used them as consumables.

Even now, these people cannot be sure about their future when moving into the zones under temporary responsibility of Russian peacekeepers in Karabakh, Azerbaijan. Official authorities and Azerbaijani laws did not permit them to do so. Azerbaijan does not intend to tolerate these jumbles on its own territories as it happened back in September-November 2020. They must already start thinking of escaping Armenia’s criminal ‘guardianship’ not to end up with nothing.

They still have an opportunity to leave these adventive lands with at least some of the hard-earned stuff. Otherwise, they only thing they can take along will be the toilet bowl, just like one of the uninvited Armenian guests did while getting out of the occupied Azerbaijani lands.

Sahil Isgandarov, political analyst

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